What can be done now to overcome the absence of digital money on blockchain networks?

Settlement of digital assets without fiat currency being available on blockchain networks is problematic, and central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) remain a distant prospect, but commercial banks are increasingly excited by the efficiency savings and service enhancements made possible by the programmability of digital money, including tokenised deposits.

Claims that money is already digital ignore the fact that payments require push-and-pull exchanges of data to complete transactions, whereas truly digital forms of money enable the sequence of actions that complete a transaction, such as financial crime checks and the availability of money in an account, to be programmed into the digital money itself.

Cryptocurrency will continue to exist as a speculative investment, though institutional investors will favour regulated cryptocurrencies and cryptocurrency investment vehicles such as the spot Bitcoin Exchange Traded Funds recently authorised in the United States, and the regulated variety of cryptocurrencies can be expected to drive out the unregulated varieties.